Indoor Pets / Gloo / Speakerfreak, The Factory Live Worthing, 31st January 2020

With so many independent venues closing down it’s great to see things going against the trend in Worthing with a new purpose built live music and club venue in the shape of The Factory Live. Fittingly, on Friday it played host to a trio of bands playing as part of Independent Venue Week – an initiative that continues to promote and support music venues, culminating in a week long celebration of gigs across the country.

First up for this one, locals Speakerfreak pulled in a good early crowd with some clear grunge and indie influences in their material. Busy gigging and with new music in the offing, next up they play a support slot for Dirty Hit protégés King Nun in Brighton on 10th February.

From just along the coast in Littlehampton, grunge-punk trio Gloo are well established on the local live circuit and showed exactly why that’s the case with a tight set of songs old and new, an undercurrent of a sped up version of The Hives shining through the vocal and guitar riffs. Already booked for 2000 Trees in the summer, keep an eye out for more live dates coming through.

Having taken a short break, headliners Indoor Pets are back with a vengeance. Often compared to the likes of Weezer and Hooton Tennis Club, the band seem to have cranked things up a notch and kept energy levels on and off stage high throughout. A confident performance and a batch of certified singalong indie-pop tracks received a warm welcome from the crowd as the band noted that they’d never played in Worthing before. Hopefully, a lot more artists who fall into the same boat will consider stopping off here now that there’s a decent sized venue for them to play at.

Keep up with the latest news from all 3 bands via the links here:
Indoor Pets  /  Gloo   /  Speakerfreak

Words and photos by Siobhan

3rd February 2020